Harriet Harman: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and Lord Chancellor (Lord Falconer of Thoroton) has made the following written statement in the other place today:
	"The Government will shortly introduce legislation to improve the administration of elections. This will be accompanied by the publication of the Government's response to the DCA policy discussion paper and the Electoral Commission's securing the vote report.
	This legislation will aim to make progress on the Government's three core principles for elections:
	access to voting for all;
	highest possible turnout; and
	lowest possible fraud.
	These key issues—access, participation and integrity—are those on which the legitimacy of our representative democracy depends.
	We need to strike a balance between security and access. The changes that the Government will propose to Parliament aim to enhance both. Our key objectives are to ensure that all who are entitled to vote are on the register and improve safeguards against fraud.
	The changes we propose include:
	introducing performance standards, to be set by the Electoral Commission in consultation with the Secretary of State, to promote best practice in electoral services;
	moving back the last date for registration, enabling people to register to vote after an election has been called;
	placing a new duty on registration officers to take all necessary steps to ensure comprehensive registers. Those steps include the following specific measures:
	(a) Sending the canvass form more than once to any address;
	(b) Making house to house inquires on more than one occasion;
	(c) Making contact by such other means as the ERO thinks appropriate with persons who do not have an entry in a register;
	(d) Inspecting any records held by any person which the ERO is permitted to inspect; and
	(e) Providing training to persons under the direction or control of the ERO in connection with the carrying out of the duty;
	giving returning officers a new power to promote elections and electoral registration;
	enabling parents and those with caring responsibilities to take children into the polling stationwith them when they go to vote;
	providing for pre-poll information to be sent to all electors including details about their vote;
	allowing electors to register anonymously in certain circumstances, so that registration doesnot compromise the safety of the vulnerable;
	lowering the age of candidacy from 21 to 18;
	simplifying guidance for voters, and enabling this to be available in languages other than English for those who need it;
	establishing a framework for returning officers to conduct reviews of polling places every fouryears to ensure they meet accessibility criteria;
	establishing two new electoral fraud offences, for falsely applying for a postal or proxy vote and for supplying false information or failing to supply information to the electoral registration officer at any time;
	providing for pilots of personal identifiers (e.g. signatures and dates of birth) at registration to test the security benefits that this could bring and measure the effect on the completeness of the register;
	establishing a framework for the co-ordinated on-line record of electors (CORE) to improve the accuracy and integrity of electoral registers and support national access and future data sharing between registers;
	revising the offence of undue influence, enabling the offence to be effective even where influence has not led to any action being taken;
	improving security markings on ballots papers;
	introducing a marked register of postal votes received, similar to that currently used for polling station voters;
	introducing statutory secrecy warnings to accompany postal and proxy voting papers to deter anyone from unlawfully attempting to influence another person's vote;
	requiring voters to sign for their ballot paper at the polling station to act as a deterrent to fraud;
	allowing access to accredited observers at polling stations and at other stages of the electoral process, such as the count, to enhance the openness and integrity of the electoral system; and
	simplifying and clarifying regulations for political parties, including by standardising the period in which election expenses can be incurred at four months.
	To provide for more flexibility and transparency in the administration of elections we will:
	enable administrators to correct clerical and administrative errors during the course of the election;
	introduce simpler and more flexible funding arrangements for national elections; and
	support the administration of postal votes by enabling automated production of postal vote documents, including by removing the counterfoil on ballot papers and replacing the stamping perforation with a pre-printed security mark.
	We will also seek to address the concerns raised by the hon. Member Sir Patrick Cormack of South Staffordshire in relation to the death of an election candidate during the campaign period by reducing the time delay for setting a new date of poll. We also intend to respond to the issue of candidates standing in more than one constituency at the same election, which Sir Patrick raised in his speech on 6 July.
	We also plan to introduce a package of secondary legislation echoing the principles I have set out above. These measures are based on existing primary legislation, and our aim is that they should be in place in time for the next local elections in May 2006, to improve public confidence in our electoral system.
	A full announcement on the secondary legislation package will be made in due course. Specifically it will deal with questions around how and when voters can apply for a postal vote or a replacement, the process by which postal votes are returned to administrators and how postal votes are collected on polling day. It will also address the issue of standard polling hours for local elections. More detail on the individual proposals are included in the response to the DCA policy discussion paper and Securing the vote report, also published today.
	These measures will be consolidated with regulations concerning access to and supply of the electoral register. Both sets of regulations will be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure. It is intended that they will be laid before Parliament in the near future so the debate can run alongside the Government's proposed legislation.
	The legislation will be accompanied by the publication of the DCA paper Electoral Administration—legislative proposals resulting from consideration of the policy discussion paper published on 25 May 2005, including a response to the Electoral Commission's securing the vote report. This paper is also available on the DCA website: www.dca.gov.uklegistelectadmin.htm."

Jack Straw: In December 2003, I set out the Government's international priorities for the next five to 10 years and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office's strategy for delivering them in a world of new challenges, opportunities and threats.
	On the basis of that strategy and the outcome of the 2004 spending round I announced on 15 December 2004, Official Report, columns 137–140WS, changes to the overseas network, aimed at enhancing our effectiveness in representing British interests abroad, and helping to deliver an efficient service on behalf of the British taxpayer.
	However, in the light of further reviews I have agreed to make the following small adjustments to our plans:
	One subordinate post, Hamburg, scheduled to remain open with locally based staff, will now close and our interests will be covered from Berlin. Two subordinate posts, Munich and Miami, will now continue to be headed by a UK based member of staff rather than covered entirely by locally engaged staff as originally proposed. Other changes will go ahead before end 2006, as previously announced.
	The overall picture on implementation of the changes announced in December is as follows:
	
		
			 Post Planned change State of Play 
		
		
			 ASIA PACIFIC   
			 Port Vila (Vanuatu) Close To be closed by end 2006 
			 Nuku'alofa (Tonga) Close To be closed by end 2006 
			 Dili (East Timor) Close To be closed by end 2006 
			 Tarawa (Kiribati) (currently a locally staffed post) Close Closed 
			   
			 AMERICAS   
			 Asuncion (Paraguay) Close Closed 
			 Nassau (Bahamas) Close Closed 
			 AFRICA   
			 Maseru (Lesotho) Close Closed 
			 Mbabane (Swaziland) Close Closed 
			 Antananarivo (Madagascar) Close Closed 
			   
			 AUSTRALIA   
			 Brisbane Localise To be localised by end 2006 
			 Perth Localise To be localised by end 2006 
			   
			 NEW ZEALAND   
			 Auckland Localise Localised 
			   
			 JAPAN   
			 Fukuoka Close Closed 
			   
			 LAOS   
			 Vientiane (Laos)(Trade Office) Close Closed 
			   
			 UNITED STATES   
			 Seattle Localise Localised 
			 Miami Localise To remain UK based 
			 Phoenix Close Closed 
			 Dallas Close Closed 
			 San Juan (Puerto Rico) Close Closed 
			   
			 FRANCE   
			 Bordeaux Localise To be localised by end 2006 
			 Lyon Localise To be localised by end 2006 
			   
			 GERMANY   
			 Munich Localise To remain UK based 
			 Hamburg Localise To close by end 2006 
			 Frankfurt Close To close by end 2006 
			 Leipzig Close Closed 
			 Stuttgart Close To close by end 2006 
			   
			 SPAIN   
			 Palma Localise To be localised by end 2006 
			 Bilbao Localise Localised 
			   
			 PORTUGAL   
			 Oporto Close Closed 
			   
			 CAMEROON   
			 Douala Close Closed 
		
	
	In addition, I have agreed the following further changes to the network:
	In Brazil, following a review of our commercial effort there, I have agreed that our Trade Offices in Belo Horizonte and Curitiba should be closed, but the existing Honorary Consuls will remain. Commercial services currently provided in Belo Horizonte and Curitiba will in future be delivered through our other posts in Brazil. In India we plan to upgrade our Business Information Centres in Pune and Chandigarh to British Trade Offices and cease to operate a Business Information Centre in Bhopal.
	The full details of these additional changes are as follows:
	
		
			 Post Planned Change 
		
		
			 Trade Office, Curitiba, Brazil Close. Honorary Consul to remain. Trade interests covered from other Posts in Brazil (Brasilia, Sao Paulo or Rio de Janeiro). 
			   
			 Trade Office, Belo Horizonte, Brazil Close. Honorary Consul to remain. Trade interests covered from other Posts in Brazil (Brasilia, Sao Paulo or Rio de Janeiro). 
			 Business Information Centre, Bhopal, India Close. British Council Library to remain. Trade interests covered from Mumbai. 
			   
			 Business Information Centre, Pune Upgrade to full Trade Office. 
			   
			 Business Information Centre, Chandigarh Upgrade to full Trade Office. 
		
	
	We have no other plans to close or open any further sovereign posts but like any well-run organisation we will continue to move resources flexibly as priorities require in line with UK interests. I will inform the House of any further planned changes.

Hilary Benn: Over the past three months a major humanitarian relief operation has been underway in Niger in response to a food crisis affecting an estimated 3 million people, with the lives of up to 150,000 children at risk. The humanitarian operation is now working at full capacity and has helped to avert a major catastrophe. The UK has played an important part, being one of the first donors to respond when the United Nations and NGO relief agencies alerted the world to the severity of the crisis. Intense media interest in the events in Niger subsequently encouraged other donors to join the effort, and an appeal by the Disasters and Emergency Committee, representing British relief and development NGOs, prompted a magnificent response from the British public.
	Throughout this crisis, the UK Government have been one of the three largest donors, with a total contribution of £3.9 million (including modest support to targeted humanitarian aid in the neighbouring states of Mali and Burkina Faso). Combined with the donations made by the public, Britain has made the biggest total contribution to the Niger relief effort.
	Although the immediate causes of Niger's problems were a poor harvest at the end of last year's growing season, and the additional stresses caused by a locust invasion in the Sahel which did significant damage to grazing lands, the crisis itself had much more complex roots and deeper causes. Niger lies at the bottom of the UN Human Development Index as the world's poorest country. A large proportion of the population is chronically poor and therefore highly vulnerable to even quite modest shortfalls of food and other necessities. Last year's harvest was in fact only 7 per cent. below the average of recent years and a year ago there were good reasons to believe that a crisis could be avoided altogether. A combination of factors—including garbled information from early warning systems, inappropriate plans for dealing with the problem, unusually high food prices, and a failure of contingency planning and disaster preparedness—tipped the balance and plunged Niger into crisis.
	The seriousness of this became evident as the results of NGO nutritional surveys became available in April and May. This was followed by an emergency appeal by the UN in mid May. DFID had been following events in the Sahel region as a whole for many months. In August last year we gave £1.5 million to the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation to help tackle the locust invasion. Our humanitarian advisers immediately contacted the UN when it launched its emergency appeal in May, and in June we sent an expert to Niger to assess the situation on the ground. This was followed by an immediate contribution of £0.5 million to support the relief efforts of the World Food Programme (WFP), followed by a further £2.7 million to the UN and to NGO partners soon afterwards. The bulk of our support was provided ahead of the coverage that drew world attention to the crisis and prompted further donations from both governments and the public.
	In the early stages of the crisis we funded two emergency airlifts, by Save the Children and UNICEF, to speed up the delivery of life-saving supplies for child nutritional therapy. Since then, as a result of our funding, the WFP has been able to deliver general food rations to 1.6 million people. OXFAM has provided much needed cash-vouchers to 131,000 people. The Save the Children Fund has treated 13,000 malnourished children and delivered medicines and supplies to 12 health centres. Islamic Relief has delivered medicines and supplies to 30 health centres. Concern has treated 6,000 malnourished children, and the World Health Organisation has helped contain a cholera outbreak that threatened to make the crisis even worse.
	To date around 2.8 million people have received food aid and more than 90,000 children have received life-saving nutritional therapy. Thanks to good rains this year, food is now being harvested and a bumper crop is expected. Nonetheless, the relief effort will continue in the months ahead, with priority being given to the needs of malnourished children and to those who will not benefit fully or adequately from the new harvest. Much work also remains to be done to help those who have suffered during the crisis to recover, and in the longer term to put in place welfare safety nets and other measures to help the most impoverished people of Niger avoid further crises of this kind.
	Although the international relief effort has succeeded in heading off a major disaster, it was too slow in getting underway. An earlier, better-planned response may well have avoided a major crisis. What has happened in Niger is symptomatic of fundamental weaknesses in the international system for humanitarian response for which urgent remedies are required.
	At the end of last year I called upon the international community to support the establishment in the UN of a large, central fund to speed up the response to humanitarian emergencies and to support wider reforms of the international system to improve its efficiency and effectiveness. If this package of reforms had been in place sooner, the crisis in Niger may have been averted. Progress is now being made in changing the system, with widespread endorsement of our reform proposals being achieved at the recent UN Millennium Review Summit and detailed follow up work now under way. So far six countries have agreed to commit $150 million to this fund next year; the UK's contribution will be $70 million (£40 million). We are pressing hard to ensure that further countries contribute in time to get the fund working in the New Year.

James Plaskitt: On behalf of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the Benefit Fraud Inspectorate (BFI) announced its phase 13 programme of work on 5 September 2005.
	Many local authority customers are let down by slow benefits services and some authorities do not seem to be tackling fraud rigorously. BFI will be undertaking seven inspections of local authorities taking longer than seven weeks on average to process housing benefits claims. The authorities are Braintree district council, Fenland district council, Isle of Anglesey county council, London Borough of Newham, London Borough of Tower Hamlets, Manchester city council, and Thurrock borough council.
	It is important to deter fraudsters by applying sanctions, including prosecutions; therefore BFI will inspect 12 authorities that in comparison with their caseload have applied few sanctions, including successful prosecutions. The authorities are Bath and North East Somerset, Durham city council, East Lothian council, Ellesmere Port and Neston borough council, Hastings borough council, Highland council, Leicester city council, Neath and Port Talbot county borough council, Newport city council, North East Derbyshire district council, Rother district council and Woking borough council.
	St. Edmundsbury borough council, who did not return performance data to the Department in 2004–05, will be inspected to determine their performance in claims cessing and customer service.
	BFI is an independent unit within the Department for Work and Pensions that inspects and reports directly to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions on the standard of benefits administration and counter-fraud activity in local authorities and the Department itself.